The mission of Seattle Presbytery is to participate, in word and deed, in God’s transforming work through the Gospel of Jesus Christ: by strengthening the witness and mission of our congregations and members and by building strong partnerships with each other and the larger Christian community.

Prayers of the People

Rev. David Norwood was killed on July 16th in a paragliding accident. Rev. David formerly served at Vashon Presbyterian Church (Seattle Presbytery) and Wapato Presbyterian Church. Please keep his family and friends in prayer.

The Yakima Herald Republic reported on this tragedy and wrote this about Rev. David:

Friends said Norwood will be remembered as a man who followed his passions and went above and beyond to help others...

News of his death left a somber cloud over Wapato, a rural Lower Yakima Valley city where he not only served as pastor for more than a decade, but also as a volunteer firefighter and a youth pastor at Campbell Farm, a summer camp just west of town.

“It’s just kind of numbing right now,” Campbell Farm Director Carman Pimms said softly during a Thursday telephone interview. “You think, he died doing what he loved doing. He loved paragliding. That free spirit. But it’s tragic. He will be missed in our community.”

Norwood served the Presbyterian Church in Wapato until 2012, and touched the lives of many families, said Jill Ross, a pastor with the Lutheran Church who provided Spanish outreach from an office in Norwood’s church. She worked closely with Norwood to secure a United Way grant for an English as a Second Language program at his church.

She described his sermons as “thoughtful and evocative.” There were five other pastors at his church, and they often gathered to discuss his sermons, she said.

Church member Jaurene Traub said Norwood displayed unconditional love, and warmly welcomed her husband, the late Marlyn Traub, to the church. Her husband was once the pastor of the Wapato Avenue Chapel before changing demographics in town and his ailing health eventually led to his church’s closure, she said.

She said Norwood’s warm welcoming eventually led her husband to become a member of the Presbyterian Church. “Which was something he thought he’d never do,” she said.